


Of Beer and Bonfires

by ellebeedarling



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Bonfires, Declarations Of Love, M/M, Underage Drinking, opal spoilers, pynchweek18, summer shenanigans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-24
Updated: 2018-07-24
Packaged: 2019-06-15 19:42:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15420192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ellebeedarling/pseuds/ellebeedarling
Summary: Adam receives a rejection letter from his top college choice, but Ronan is there to distract him and help him see things in a new light. In fact, Ronan always seems to be helping Adam over some hurdle or another. And on a night when Adam has experienced yet another devastating blow, Ronan helps him yet again by telling him the one thing that could make him forget all his past pain and heartache.





	Of Beer and Bonfires

**Author's Note:**

> Set during the short story "Opal" and therefore contains spoilers. 
> 
> Written for Pynchweek18 on Tumblr. Day 3: Summer/Bonfire/Pride
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

It was a night for getting drunk. 

 

Adam had never been much of a drinker, though he drank more now that he was dating Ronan Lynch. Ronan had always been a heavy drinker, though he drank considerably less now that he was dating Adam Parrish. 

 

The rejection letter had stung bitterly, but Ronan had helped to ease his mind, offered him support and encouragement, a different point of view. Ronan Lynch was much better at that than most folks gave him credit for. Then again, Ronan wasn’t terribly invested in making other people feel better. That was a special secret reserved for exclusively for Adam. Turned out Ronan was full of secrets. 

 

After spending the afternoon cutting doughnuts in the back field with the BMW, the pair of boys had cooled off by going for a dip in the murky swimming hole Adam had dug earlier in the year. It was amazing that Ronan was willing to shirk all his plans and any responsibilities - if you could use that term for Ronan’s day-to-day activities - in order to help Adam take his mind off things and come to terms with the fact that one of his options - his most coveted option - had been stripped from him. 

 

It turned out that Ronan was a very good distraction in many, varied ways. Adam had discovered it was hard to be disappointed - indeed it was hard to have thoughts at all - when his boyfriend’s overheated body, pink from too much sun exposure, was wrapped carelessly around him in a pool of crisp, cool water. 

 

The beer was not so much a necessary thing, at this point, as it was the whipped topping - the coup de grace - on a day designed with singular purpose: to make Adam forget his troubles. 

 

It was working. 

 

They’d roasted hot dogs - which seemed to be Ronan’s favorite food - over an open fire built within a ring of what Adam supposed were magical stones in the backyard. 

 

Once, when Adam was a kid, his dad had let him go on a campout with a boy’s group from one of the local churches. It was supposed to be a father-son campout, but even then Adam had known that it’d be a cold day in hell before his father did anything to make Adam feel loved and accepted - like he belonged somewhere. So Adam had gone, sans Robert Parrish, and he’d been assigned to one of the men volunteering as surrogate fathers for the community’s  _ less-fortunate _ kids. It was the only time he’d eaten hot dogs roasted over an open campfire before tonight. That night his dinner had been soured by the flavor of loneliness and the exclusion that came from being so  _ other  _ compared to the boys who were attending with their actual fathers instead of borrowed ones. 

 

Tonight, he discovered what a treat fire-roasted hot dogs were when they were flavored with the mud of the back field, the gasoline of the BMW, and the taste of Ronan Lynch’s sun-kissed lips. Probably, this was the best meal he’d ever eaten, and that included the fancy party foods he’d been fed at the Gansey mansion on the one occasion he’d visited. An entire lifetime had passed since he’d left his parents’ home. His life was constantly growing, changing, evolving - more for the better than the worse these days. 

 

It was an entirely new phenomenon for Adam Parrish. 

 

Things being good. Things going right. 

 

He sat in an Adirondack chair, well out of reach of the fire’s heat. The night was sweltery and muggy, scented with woodsmoke and sweat, and Ronan had dragged an enormous pile of useless, broken furniture - stuff that was neither sentimental nor valuable - out of a barn and had begun adding it to the fire so that the flames towered above them, shooting sparks of ash into the air. Adam now knew for certain that the rocks were magical because the flame arced skyward, dwarfing the boys and the smallest of the outbuildings, but never increasing in diameter or venturing outside of the ring of stone no matter how many chunks of broken wood Ronan tossed into the fire’s maw. 

 

Ronan was dancing around the stones like a pagan, and belting some sort of Irish drinking song. Adam was rather convinced that  _ all _ Irish songs were drinking songs, despite Ronan’s insistence otherwise. Adam couldn’t take his eyes off the other boy. The firelight flickered around him, casting shadows larger than life, and Ronan moved to the rhythm in his head - tempestuous and untamed.

 

Adam felt muzzy and weird - side-effect of the beer. But he also felt warm and blissful, insouciant and serene. Ronan stumbled toward the fire, which buffeted him backward into safety -  _ magic _ \- and Adam laughed until the other boy came to pull him out of the chair. They stared at each other, chests thumping with anticipation for a few brief moments before Ronan kissed him -  messy and breathless and tasting of beer - then he broke away to insist that Adam join him in his dancing. 

 

Adam was no dancer. 

 

For a few horrified moments, he remembered Gansey attempting to teach him some formal dances - a waltz and a minuet, he thought - for the annual prom-ball-shindig that partnered Aglionby’s raven boys with young ladies from an all-girls school two towns over. His first year at Aglionby, he’d had to work the night of the dance and couldn’t afford to try to get out of it, even though it had cost him favor with some of the school’s administrators. This year, he’d been dating Ronan and had no desire to pretend otherwise for a night. He’d briefly considered asking Ronan about seeking permission to attend the dance together but dismissed the thought as quickly as it had come. As much as the rest of the gang seemed to look to Adam for ideas - for a plan of action - his first thoughts weren’t always his best thoughts. It was all too easy to imagine the ballroom in flames as Ronan - maniacally laughing - stood in the center of it with a can of gasoline and a box of matches. He never told Ronan that he’d even considered it. 

 

Instead, the pair of them had sneaked off in the BMW, racing through the quiet streets of Henrietta for hours, then finding a secluded spot to park the car and test the non-existent boundaries of their newly discovered physical relationship in the back seat. 

 

Adam had felt like such a rebel then. Sneaking around, ditching the dance, having sex with a wild boy in the back seat of a sports car. Adam felt a touch of that rebelliousness now as he forgot what little Gansey had taught him about ballroom dancing and clutched at Ronan’s hips in an enthusiastic attempt to learn the steps of the Irish jig Ronan endeavored to impart. Adam was clumsy but happy, graceless but unperturbed. Filled with laughter and hedonism, he followed Ronan around the fire, matching his footsteps to the other boy’s as best as he could. 

 

They danced, and they kissed, and they laughed. They drank beer in between. Adam felt more alive than he had in ages. Ronan’s blue eyes were wild with fire and lust and intoxication. Adam’s heartbeat found its counterpart in Ronan Lynch. They moved around the fire in a parody of rhythm and finesse in their jeans and bare feet, heads thrown back gleefully. Their shirts had been abandoned to swim earlier, and the sticky summer air had prevented their reappearance afterward. Adam’s eyes were drawn to Ronan’s bare chest, toward muscle and pale skin and heat. Ronan watched Adam with equal hunger. Adam’s smirk was wicked and ravenous, and Ronan moved toward him with a feral growl. 

 

“Do you still know how to play those bagpipes in your room?” Adam asked with a hand on Ronan’s chest. 

 

The question seemed to confound the other boy. His gaze went from lustful to confused to angry in the space of a heartbeat. “Bagpipes?” he asked, as though the word had never occurred to him before. 

 

“Bagpipes,” Adam repeated, giggling at Ronan’s stupidity. 

 

Ronan blinked at him then sulked off to retrieve the instrument in question. Adam settled himself back into the Adirondack chair, skin sticking to the painted wood. He abandoned the remainder of his beer, figuring correctly that he’d had enough. It was one thing to get giddily drunk, and another to end up puking his guts out and regretting the whole night. Ronan returned amidst a clamor like braying donkeys, a scowl etched plainly into his dark features. Clearly, this was not the turn he’d expected the evening to take. 

 

Adam was enjoying himself immensely. 

 

In Ronan’s drunken and unpracticed state, it took him a few moments to reacquaint himself with the instrument, but soon, he began playing a low, droning melody - a piece too somber for the occasion, Adam thought. He watched the other boy closely - the haunting song soothing him in ways he was unprepared for - and saw the precise moment that Ronan gave himself over to his memories. It was thrilling and heartbreaking and awe-inspiring all at once. 

 

Ronan was beautiful like this. 

 

Eyes closed to drink in the cherished memories the music evoked. Pale skin awash with flame and shadows. Body swaying to the melody of the pipes. 

 

Adam’s heart burned within him, ignited by a stray spark from Ronan or the fire that surrounded him. Ronan was invincible. Adam sensed that he could stand in the midst of that inferno and come out completely unscathed. The melody shifted into a jaunty reel - the same one Ronan had whistled in the Cabeswater cave. Memories swam through Adam - wistful and crushing, sweet and terrible. He felt on the verge of tears. He should probably give up drinking altogether. No one liked a sappy drunk. 

 

On the third song, Ronan faltered over the notes and gave up on the bagpipes in a huff. Adam did not miss the gentle way the boy set them in a chair rather than tossing them to the ground as he might have with anything else. “Did your dad give you those?” 

 

Ronan didn’t answer, but his eyes glistened as he fought back tears. Adam’s heart burned some more, and unable to resist the draw of the other man, he rose from his chair to go to him. 

 

Ronan stared at the flames in the circle of stones, lost to memory and heartache. Adam felt bad for tearing down the pleasant mood they’d been cultivating all day. He tucked his fingers into Ronan’s palm, smiling to himself when he felt a gentle squeeze of acknowledgment. 

 

Time seemed to stand still as they stayed, hand-in-hand, by the blaze. Adam wished he could see into Ronan’s mind sometimes, though he’d been warned - by Ronan  _ and _ Gansey - that it was a dangerous place to be. But he wanted to know what the other boy was thinking. 

 

Ronan had a tendency to be cryptic when, in Adam’s mind, it was unwarranted. It was a defense mechanism, Adam knew, but it was frustrating when you cared for someone so much. At times it felt like Ronan was purposely keeping parts of himself walled off from Adam, though he supposed he was equally guilty in that department. 

 

How could two such broken things work so well together?

 

“Tell me about him,” Adam heard himself whisper. Ronan so rarely talked about his family. His father, in particular. At times, Adam felt like a stranger in Ronan’s world. 

 

Ronan was quiet, as though he hadn’t heard. Adam didn’t know if he had the courage to ask again. Maybe it was the booze talking, or maybe it was the raw emotion that still lingered on Ronan’s face after playing the music from his childhood, but he wanted to know, dammit. He wanted that glimpse into Ronan’s past, the heartbreak that had shaped him into the often sullen, frequently angry man at his side. 

 

He was trying to work up the nerve to speak again when Ronan beat him to it. 

 

“ Omnia vincit amor,” he murmured softly.  _ Love conquers all things.  _

 

Adam stared at him, slightly confused in the haze of his drunkenness. 

 

“I loved him,” Ronan explained. “Declan always thought I didn’t see his flaws, but… I did. I knew. I knew what he was, what people said about him, but… I didn’t care. He was my dad. I loved him. He always said I was his favorite.” The smile that tugged at the corners of Ronan’s mouth was sad, full of bitter memory and sorrow. “He was wild… carefree… care _ less _ .” The last word was delivered frostily, tinged with Ronan’s customary anger. 

 

With a sigh, Ronan continued. “He was fun and funny. He loved to tell stories. I was almost always the hero of the story. Sometimes Matthew was. But he was also a liar and a cheat and a self-important jackass, and… and I loved him for all those things.”

 

A solitary tear slid down Ronan’s cheek, and Adam turned the man toward him in order to kiss it away. “He sounds wonderful.”

 

“He was.” 

 

Ronan looked away and dragged a wrist under his eyes, under his nose, sniffing away the last of the emotion. Stepping toward his chair, he snatched up his beer bottle and finished it off before hurling it into the fire where it hit one of the stones and shattered, glass flying everywhere. Adam watched him carefully return his memories to their place, silently packing them away to dwell on another day. 

 

When he met Adam’s eyes again, the sadness was gone. In its place sat a playful mischief. “This is fucked,” he said. “Let’s dance again.” 

 

Seizing Adam’s wrists, Ronan dragged him around the flames once more, and as quickly as the somberness had fallen, it was replaced by the joy they’d been reveling in earlier. Adam forgot his inhibitions as they danced, head thrown back and most likely making a fool of himself. He didn’t care. All he wanted to focus on was the floaty feeling in his chest from the booze, from Ronan. 

 

Round and round they went, moving faster and faster, laughing louder and louder, until Adam tripped and sent them both careening toward the ground. They landed in a heap of arms and legs, knees and elbows, laughing hysterically as they tried to disentangle themselves. 

 

They ended up sprawled on their backs, chests heaving, staring up at the stars in the night sky. As the after-effects of their antics began to wear off, Adam found himself drifting toward sleep. He was nearly there, blinking slowly against the light from the fire when Ronan gripped his hand, braiding their fingers together. 

 

“I love you,” Ronan whispered. 

 

Adam glanced at him. The other man was still peering up into the darkness, one hand clasping Adam’s, the other curled into a loose fist against his chest. Adam’s grandmother may have been the only other person in his life to have uttered those three words to him, and it had been years since he’d heard them. 

 

He knew already how Ronan felt about him, though neither of them had ever spoken it aloud. Knowing how difficult it was for Ronan to express himself made the simple statement that much more meaningful. 

 

Swallowing around the large lump in his throat, Adam whispered harshly, “I love you, too.” 

 

Ronan’s head rolled to the side, and he watched Adam for a few brief moments before a slow grin curled his lips upwards. He squeezed Adam’s fingers lightly and both boys returned to their stargazing. 

 

**

 

Adam awoke in Ronan’s bed with no recollection of how he’d gotten there. A quick assessment revealed that he and Ronan were both still in the jeans they’d been wearing the night before. He curled onto his side, fists under his cheeks to look at the bed’s other occupant.

 

Ronan was on his stomach, arms tucked under his head, and Adam didn’t think he’d ever seen the other boy looking so peaceful. Adam shifted, and Ronan’s eyes popped open with a grunt. He couldn’t help but smile as Ronan appraised him. 

 

“What?” Ronan asked gruffly, which only widened Adam’s smile. 

 

“Nothing.” 

 

Ronan rolled his eyes and turned over. He yawned and scratched his bare stomach idly. “Whatever, man.” When Ronan’s blue eyes met Adam’s again, they were soft and vulnerable. It felt like Adam was looking directly into his heart. 

 

Adam couldn’t resist stealing a kiss. “Say it again?” he whispered against Ronan’s lips. 

 

Ronan arched an eyebrow at him. “You’re a fucking sap, Parrish.” 

 

“So are you, Lynch,” Adam countered. 

 

With an amused snort, Ronan rolled onto his side facing Adam, mirroring his pose. One corner of his mouth ticked up in a wry smile. “I love you,” he said softly, leaning in to peck Adam’s lips. 

 

“I love you, too,” Adam responded, feeling almost giddy. 

 

“But don’t go getting all fucking mushy and weird on me,” Ronan said, hauling himself out of bed. Despite his words, Ronan paused in the doorway and grinned at Adam before taking off down the hall. 

 

Adam spread out on his back, hands tucked behind his head as he watched the shadows of leaves dance in the sunlight across the ceiling. He almost never let himself revel in these types of moments. Good times, good feelings and memories, were hard fought for things in the world of Adam Parrish. Reality was always standing nearby ready to slap him back down if he got too uppity. But just this once, he wanted to bask in the feeling of being loved - truly loved - for possibly the first time in his entire life. 

 

Ronan’s shaved head poked back into the doorway a second later, a disgruntled scowl etched onto his face. “You coming to shower with me or what? I can smell you from here.” 

 

Adam laughed then bounced off the bed and followed. There was absolutely no danger of Ronan Lynch every becoming too mushy or sappy. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! 
> 
> Much love, Elle


End file.
